Page 181 of Taken By Shadows

Kaed knelt in front of me, bending low.

A ragged breath tore from him as he nuzzled along my entrance and I knew he could smell me. His teeth nipped at the delicate fabric of my undergarments. With his free hands, he hooked the lacey scrap of fabric until it pooled around my ankles.

And then his lips finally touched mine.

His tongue moved over my centre, parting the neat folds and licking everything.

The tight bundle of nerves that came together at the apex of my centre screamed in response to the touch of his tongue.

Or maybe I screamed.

My senses didn’t know how to focus on anything except the way he devoured me.

Kaed flicked his tongue back and forth over the bud of my arousal until I ached to come undone. And then he sucked. Tugging at my restraint. His teeth grazed the edges of the nerves, and I whimpered.

Relentless in his hunger, he licked every bit of me, and then he feasted on the ripple of pleasure that tore through me.

I gripped his hair and held his head exactly where I wanted it. I couldn’t find air. Couldn’t find words. But I knew Kaed was there. And that was all I needed.

I shattered. I burned. And I came undone all over his tongue.

Maybe I didn’t beg. But I cried his name over and over again, as cascades of pleasure rushed over me.

And then I collapsed, boneless and dripping.

Kaed ran a hand between my legs, and it came away wet as he cleaned me up.

“Thank you,” I mumbled as I wrapped the sheets around me, and he crawled back to me.

“I think you’ve got that the wrong way around. I should be thanking you.”

I looked at him, confused. I was the one who had just found my release all over him. Not the other way around. But I suddenly realised I would need that too. Soon. I was hungry for it.

“I’ve been imagining doing that to you for a long time.”

“You have?”

He nodded quietly and traced lazy lines over my skin with his hands. “I wanted to know …” He actually faltered. Fumbled for words. I caught the first glimmer of something like bashfulness in him. But he washed it away and, with menace, said, “If you tasted like peaches too.”

Heat flushed to my cheeks and my core.

“You smell like peaches. And now …” He sucked the fingers he’d run along my centre. And a feral rumble sounded in his chest.

And very suddenly, his pet name for me took on a very different meaning. I retrospectively felt the blushes of every time he’d used that name for me in front of others.

“It’s been torture,” he said.

“Is that all I am? A torture?” I mocked.

He growled and cradled me. “Maybe I like a little torture.”

“Giving or receiving?” What was I doing? I’d become bold—or deranged—by the orgasm that still racked my body.

Kaed searched my eyes for any hint of fear.

He would find none.

“There are so many things I want to do to you, Imogen.” He sighed, and his forehead came to meet mine.